CHURCH POLITICS.

Press, Volume LXII, Issue 18625, 25 February 1926, Page 9

CHURCH POLITICS.

ANNOUNCEMENT BY THE POPE. <BY CABLE--PRISSS ASSOCUTION-COPHUGnT.) (AUSTRALIA!? AND K.Z CABLE ASSOCIATION.) 'HOME, February 23. Tho Pope, in a. letter to his Secretary of State, Cardinal Gaspan-i, emphasises that the faet that prelates were invited cmd participated in the commission to revise the ecclesiastical legislation which Parliament will shortly ratify, does not imply that the reforms havo been carried out in agreement with the Holy

Although tho Pope admits that the legislation constitutes aii improvement, he affirms that nobody possesses the right to legislate ecclesiastically without direct agreement with tho Vatican, nor is it possible to give the Catholic Church in Italy a legal status uutil the iniquitous conditions in which the Holy See and Roman Pontiffs find themselves, have been removed.

[About twelve months ago the first stops wcro made towards reconciliation of the differences dividing the Vatican and the Italian Government. The likelihood of a, concordat being arrived at was freely discussed. In 1870 the \xm> fication of Italy was completed by Victor Emmanuel's Army- entering the Papal Statos, and tho Popo deprived of his temporal power, Pius IX. declared himself a prisoner, refusing to recognise the validity of the Italian Government's action, and for the rest of his life remained in the Vatican. By an Italian law dated May, 1871, thero was guaranteed to tho Pope and his for over, besides possession of tho Vatican and Lateran palaces and tho villa of Castel Gandolfo, a yearly income of 3,225,000 lire, which -allowance still remains unclaimed and unpaid. The present Pone, Pius XL, who was elected on February 6th, 1922T, broke with this tradition by giving his first blessing to the pcoplo publicly from the exterior of a balcony of St. Peter's, this being the first public appearance of a Popo since 1870.]